Most people
in the 21st century look back on earlier times and wonder how
folks could ever have believed in the divine right of kings (other
than the king himself).

Well, we
better wipe that condescending smile off our faces, because we
are no better today right here in the good old U.S. of A.

The divine
right of kings carried with it the notion that whatever the king
did was OK, because the king was the law. Another way of saying
the same thing is the king was considered to be above the law.

Today we
have renamed this very mistaken view as the doctrine of sovereign
immunity. The sovereign is immune from suffering any consequences
of his acts. Sometimes the sovereign (government) graciously allows
himself to be sued in specific, limited cases. But for the most
part, there is no accountability for government officials who
lie, cheat and steal ­ and even on occasion, for those who commit
murder. Remember Ruby Ridge, where an FBI sniper shot in cold
blood a woman holding a baby?

Bob Arwady
runs the Ammo Dump, a gun store in Houston, Texas. His first exposure
to the abuses of sovereign immunity came from a knock on the door
from the Texas Commission on Environmental Quality. After operating
his new shooting range for police and public shooters for four
months, the Commission shut him down with the threat of fining
shooters $5,000 for each bullet they put in the dirt berms used
as bullet traps. They claimed that they had a water sample that
proved that those bullets were leaching lead in dangerous quantities
into the stream behind his range and polluting water downstream.

It turns
out that the signed affidavit by the Environmental Quality officer
stating that he had taken the water sample was a lie. Arwady never
got to use his expert toxicology witness who would have argued
that metallic bullets never, ever leach. It is not soluble. Only
lead salts (such as those found in lead paints) are dangerous.

Arwady's
expert testimony was used last year in California to stop a new
EPA attack on lead shotgun pellets.

But the lying
government "scientist" never lost a day's pay, let alone served
time in jail for perjury. Perhaps it is a bit much to expect a
prosecutor to press charges against a perjurer he knew, or had
reason to know, was lying through his teeth.

Soon after,
the Bureau of Alcohol, Tobacco, Firearms and Explosives (BATFE)
brought criminal charges against Arwady. They filed nine charges
claiming that he was illegally selling guns, thus serving as a
source of guns used in crimes. Three witnesses were used at the
trial to show that Arwady knowingly sold guns illegally (not keeping
a record of the customers who bought them) and that he knowingly
sold them to felons.

One of the
witnesses against Arwady was a retired cop who had stolen guns
from Arwady while working for him and then sold them illegally.
He testified in exchange for a lesser sentence. Another witness
was a gunsmith who had bought guns from Arwady even though he
was a felon. Arwady dealt with him before background checks were
federally mandated, when people simply asserted that they were
not felons. The gunsmith also testified in exchange for the promise
of a lesser sentence.

The third
witness against Arwady was the parole officer who at one time
had supervised the gunsmith. The BATFE (and perhaps state and
county officials) pressured him to testify that he had called
Arwady several times warning him that the smith was a felon. It
turned out that was a flat-out lie. The parole officer had not
supervised the gunsmith for a full five years before the smith
began to buy guns from Arwady.

A motion
by Arwady's attorney to charge the parole officer for perjury
was denied by the judge. After all, a lot of BATFE agents, local
cops and state and federal prosecutors might have been implicated
in the lie.

At least
the jury acquitted Arwady of all charges.

Now Arwady
is facing the loss of his federal license to do business based
on a case the BATFE has developed using information from their
criminal case against Arwady. They do not even blush that this
is strictly and precisely forbidden by federal law (18 U.S. C.
923 (f)

I thought
it was curious that after months of deliberating, BATFE announced
the day after the November 7 elections transferred control of
Congress to the Democrats that the agency was going to pull Arwady's
license.

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So far, Bob
Arwady's direct expenses (not counting loss of business) in defending
himself against a string of lying, lawbreakers with badges exceeds
half a million dollars. Gun Owners Foundation will be helping
Arwady with his legal expenses.

Tax-deductible
donations can be made to the Foundation so it can help Bob Arwady.
Donations may be made on line at Gunowners.com/donate.htm
or by calling (703) 321-8585.

Larry Pratt has been Executive Director of Gun
Owners of America for 27 years. GOA is a national membership organization
of 300,000 Americans dedicated to promoting their second amendment freedom
to keep and bear arms.

He published a book, Armed People Victorious,
in 1990 and was editor of a book, Safeguarding Liberty: The Constitution
& Militias, 1995. His latest book, On the Firing Line: Essays in the Defense
of Liberty was published in 2001.

The
divine right of kings carried with it the notion that whatever the king
did was OK, because the king was the law. Another way of saying the same
thing is the king was considered to be above the law.